Herbs, erect or suffrutescent perennial, 1.5-4 dm, woody at base. Stems terete, finely white-mealy when young. Leaves alternate, petiolate proximally, becoming sessile distally, crowded; blade oblanceolate or proximal rhombic, 10-20(-30) × 3-15 mm, base cuneate or attenuate, margin entire to repand-denticulate, apex acute to obtuse, scurfy. Staminate flowers in axillary glomerules, in short axillary spikes or terminal spikes. Pistillate flowers axillary, solitary or few and clustered below staminate. Fruiting bracteoles sessile, bordered by narrow horizontal wing or acutely angled, broadly turbinate or hemispheric, united except at minute apical tips, 6-12 mm, spongy and inflated at maturity, flattened at summit. Seeds dimorphic: dark reddish brown, 1.5 mm wide, or black, slightly smaller; radicle basal, horizontal.

Sparingly escaped from cultivation; introduced; Calif.; Australia.